WARNING: One big Dead Man's Chest spoiler.

Twilight

By Dream Descends

Elizabeth wonders how he can be gone, when the heat of his hand still brushes her fingertips now and then. Each time she turns, face flushed, expecting the tricky stare of a man who knows more than he should, expecting his sly breath on her cheek. She sleeps when she can, waking to the scrape of her nails across his neck, reaching feverishly for a dream that has already stumbled away.

Jack Sparrow is more real to her than the rank, stale she breathes, and he is dead.

His absence traps her, much like a pair of shackles, dragging his ghost along with her wherever she goes. His shackles. She is trapped in that moment, the memory of steel and burning wood, as she takes what she can from him and then leaves him to die. He is a better thief than her, however.

Will tries with everything in him. He is there, fierce and cold, hovering around her world of screaming, unsatisfied lust and freezing shame. He glows like a pale moon against the blazing fire of Jack's sun, orbiting her mind without end. Her fiancé, her childhood, her love and her heart—Will is half of her.

But Jack is her soul. Jack is her hunger and her thirst, her drive and passion.

She worries, often, usually alone. She worries and cries because Jack is her freedom and Jack is dead.

She wonders how Will can compete with that.

FIN